Turning Up Toes
by Lizzie83hp
Summary: The facts were these.


_At this very moment, in the Milky Way galaxy, the Doctor was 900 years, 27 weeks, 6 days and 3 minutes old. His dog K-9 was 150 years, 2 weeks, 6 days, 5 hours and three minutes old - and not a minute older._

K-9 was moving with a surprising amount of speed through the field of bright green grass. The Doctor ran not too far behind him, trying very hard to catch up and coax the dog back into the TARDIS. Of all the times for him to experience what it was like to be a real dog, one of flesh and bone, K-9 _had_ to pick the most inconvenient one. His tail wagged happily as any dog's would have, but the Doctor didn't imagine that an ordinary golden retriever would repeatedly make beeping and whirring noises.

And then, out of nowhere, it struck.

A passing starship, one hovering mere inches from the ground, chose that very moment to cut clear across the field. The captain of the ship did not have a full view of the field below him from his vantage point in the control room. It continued forward without slowing its speed in the slightest, striking K-9 and sending him flying. As he soared through the blue sky, he appeared as though he was propelled solely by his own accord. That is, until he landed once more on solid ground, and the Doctor found that he moved no more.

Filled with a horrible sadness at the sight of his dead best friend, the Doctor inched forwards with great hesitance, intending to simply hold the dog one last time.

He knelt down in the grass beside K-9, and with a slow moving hand, touched his cool metal body. What appeared to be a spark jumped between the Doctor's forefinger and the dog, and almost immediately, K-9's systems sprang to life once more, and once the Doctor had turned him upright once more, he was off, continuing his path down the field, leaving his stupefied master in his wake.

_This was the moment the Doctor realized he wasn't like the other Time Lords. Nor was he like anyone else, for that matter._

_The Doctor could touch dead things and bring them back to life. It was a gift given to him, but not by anyone in particular. There was no box, no instructions, no manufacturer's warranty. It just was. The terms of use weren't immediately clear, nor were they of any immediate concern._

* * *

Several years later, the Doctor was stood in the cheerfully decorated kitchen belonging to his mother. A fellow Time Lord (a Time _Lady_, she was known to correct others in her youth), she had decided to take up a permanent residence in a quaint, quiet little village instead of following her son in his travels across the universe. There was no true home left for her to return to, owing to the death of their entire race, apart from the two of them, who barely escaped themselves. And so, she made do, living in the sleepy Leadworth and baking pastries for whichever neighbour decided to pop by and visit her each day. Her specialty was pie.

Pumps clicking against the tile, she bent to her oven to check on her latest delicious treat while looking lovingly over at her son, who seemed preoccupied with watching whatever - or whomever - was just outside the window.

In fact, the Doctor was looking across the road at the large home owned by the Pond family, home to widowed businessman Augustus Pond and his young daughter by the name of Amelia. At this very moment, Amelia was 19 years, 42 weeks, 3 hours and 2 minutes old, with long tresses of red hair and an imagination larger than her village itself. She was currently stood in front of a large garden of flowers that she kept up with her father, who was, at that moment, watering them with a long hose. The Doctor watched as Augustus Pond lowered the water pressure on the hose and for a split second, sprayed his daughter with it. Amelia threw her head back in what the Doctor could only assume was a loud burst of laughter, before she bent over, ripped a weed from the grass and playfully hurled it in his direction.

The Doctor envied her greatly. Though she was devoid of her mother, young Amelia had what the Doctor did not - a father. Though, he imagined that Amelia most likely greatly envied him for his mother. Losing those closest to you is not an easy business, as both of them knew. Both of them also knew that this was also inevitable, and that there was nothing one could do to change it.

Amelia peered up from her work in the garden and looked around her little world, and noticed the Doctor at the window across the road. She smiled a wide, dimpled grin at him and momentarily embarrassed at the thought of being caught as he envied her, the Doctor looked down at the windowsill, pretending he was merely inspecting the small potted plants that sat there. He noticed a fly lying on its back, stone cold dead, just behind a small beansprout. Without thinking, he touched it, and the fly flipped over and soared away happily.

_The Doctor felt as though he was under a spell, until a blood vessel in his mother's brain burst, killing her instantly._

He was brought harshly back to reality by the sound of something heavy slamming to the floor, and turned to find his mother lying on her back, her eyes wide open but her body completely still. For the briefest of moments, the Doctor did not think clearly, and preoccupied only with the thought of having his mother hold him again, he brought a hand to her cheek just to feel her skin while she was still warm. She blinked, and with a great gasp, the life returned to her and she sat upright from her place on the linoleum kitchen floor, looking faintly dazed, just as a bell sounded from somewhere behind the two of them.

Realizing just what he had done, the Doctor slowly backed away until he was leaning against the kitchen cupboards, all the while staring open-mouthed at the woman who he had just awakened from the dead. His mother stared at him with confusion in her eyes.

"Did the timer go off?" she asked him. "I must have slipped. Clumsy me."

_The Doctor's random gift came with a caveat or two. It was a gift that not only gave - it took._

The Doctor sat down at his mother's kitchen table, still finding himself unable to take his eyes off of her. She removed an apple pie from the oven and placed it lightly on the windowsill between her plants, allowing it to bask in the fresh air from the window for a moment to cool off. Whilst by the window, she looked over at the Pond family, smiling and waving to Augustus, who did the same in return. At that very moment, Amelia got his attention and spoke to him for a brief moment. He nodded, and with great excitement on her face, Amelia went tearing into their house, leaving Augustus in the garden as he continued to water their flowers.

His mother left her place at the window and turned to the counter behind her, picking up a raspberry pie and placing that inside the still-hot oven, her warm brown hair falling slightly in front of her face as she did so. He watched as she turned the timer on the oven, brought the now-cooler pie to the table and then turned back to her son, smiling at him.

Just as the Doctor took his first bite of the perfectly flaky and deliciously comforting apple, both he and his mother heard a terrible scream from outside. Both of them hurried to the window to find the source of the sound, and their eyes were drawn to the Ponds' front garden. Augustus Pond was lying on his back, the still-spouting water hose on the ground next to him. Amelia Pond was stood on the front porch of their house, her short blue dress blowing in a gentle breeze as she covered her face with both hands, looking aghast, before she ran to her father's side. She dropped to the sopping wet grass beside him and tried with all her might to awaken him, all to no avail.

_From that point onward, the Doctor thought of the pie he had tasted on that fateful morning as being the most delicious pie ever baked, as it was the pie that was not meant to be. However, the Doctor also realized that somehow, in the grand universal scheme of things, he had traded his mother's life for Amelia's father's - and he was horrified._

Later that evening, the Doctor watched as an ambulance pulled away from the Ponds' front door, taking the body of Augustus Pond with it and leaving a lost-looking Amelia standing there with a strange woman. His mother had told him that this was her aunt Sharon - a reclusive woman who had recently experienced the death of her husband - who had come to live with Amelia.

The conversation between the Doctor and his mother that evening was very sombre. Neither had much of an idea of what to say to each other, as the events they had witnessed had put a large damper on both of their spirits, although for very different reasons. His mother had considered Augustus Pond a great friend, and was also worried for young Amelia, a girl whose only family left in the world was her one solitary aunt. The Doctor, however, could not escape the fact that he had inadvertently killed the girl's father and was, in essence, the reason for the great disturbance in her life.

And so, he bade farewell to his mother late that evening, vowing to return to visit her in the very near future, when he was hopeful that the sadness would have abated from the area. With an oven-gloved hand, she squeezed his hand, and moved in to press a kiss to his cheek.

This one, simple touch was all it took for the Doctor's mother to fall back on the carpet of her front hall, dead. And this time, for good. In a panic, he threw himself to the floor beside her and touched her cheek, and upon receiving no response, he touched her again. He reached for her arm and then for her hand, but the woman he dearly loved did not move again.

_There was one more thing about touching dead things that the Doctor didn't know, and he learned it in the most unfortunate way. First touch, life. Second touch, dead again. Forever._

Amelia attended the funeral of her mother a week later. As it happened, the funeral for the Doctor's mother was held on that very same day, on the opposite end of the very small Leadworth graveyard. The funeral for Augustus Pond was attended only by Amelia and her aunt Sharon, a very sparse turnout that was to be expected for a man who died very suddenly, very unexpectedly and without any other family to mourn him. The same was true for the Doctor's mother, a woman who had no other family apart from the son that mourned enough for an entire parade of funeralgoers.

From the other side of the graveyard, Amelia looked over at the funeral for the kind woman that had lived across the road from her and her father, the one that she had known best for her delectable pies. Her only son, the man that she had seen several times before but whom she had never spoken to was the only mourner. He seemed to know that he was being watched and suddenly looked up and over at here. Neither gestured to one another nor yelled out a single word, but each simply watched the other, aware of their unspoken bond and their mutual sadness. They broke their gazes at the same time and returned to look at the coffins lowering into the ground, each mindful of the plight of the other.

This downcast morning was the last time the Doctor and Amelia saw each other for several years, during which time a great deal occurred.

* * *

**A/N: The idea for this story struck me late last night and I have been aggressively writing and re-watching the Pushing Daisies pilot ever since. For those of you that have never seen this show, I implore you to do so - it's one of the loveliest pieces of television I have ever seen. For those that haven't seen it, the italicized text is the narrator, who is voiced by Jim Dale on the show. If that alone doesn't entice you to watch it, I haven't the faintest idea what will.**

**And to those that are wondering when I'm going to update my other ongoing stories - I'm writing new chapters for just about everything else simultaneous to this new story! I won't give specific dates as to when I hope to have updates out by (because I am notoriously bad for keeping up with them), but do know that there will be new things out relatively soon! x**


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